


All the flowers in my garden

by Sand_Cursive



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Comfort, Friendship, Gen, after the war
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-27
Updated: 2015-10-19
Packaged: 2018-04-17 09:42:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4661952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sand_Cursive/pseuds/Sand_Cursive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the speak, they breathe in the dust of the fallen. All are equal in the end. </p><p>A story about Rose after the war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The shape of smoke and fear

When the dust clears, there is nothing but ash. Ash and the glittering clouds of crystal fragments, shimmering in the air and lending a surreal quality to the skies. Like tiny stars falling from the heavens. It is too beautiful to be the bones of friends and enemies.

Rose refuses to release the shield until the last twinkling speck has settled into the dirt.

Garnet ventures forwards first, kicking up clouds of debris that burst high into the air and cling to her clothes. It will be decades before she can move without feeling the weight of their choice in every step. She keeps her mouth consciously closed, lips pressed tighter than her resolution.

Pearl waits until she is a decent distance away, until the clouds have left with her and she knows she won’t be tasting death on her words. “What do we do now?”

Rose looks down at her, wants to smile and share some strength, insincere though it might be. There is nothing but weariness in her bones. Instead she looks after Garnet and feels consequence laying itself over her shoulders, in her hair, in the folds of fabric in her dress. “We move on.”

Pearl shudders and Rose tries not to, and gripping the hands of her friends they move forward. Their steps are small and short and so soft and still they walk through the insubstantial banks of wreckage that once were friends. It is the worst for Amethyst, smallest of them all. She shines covered in a skin made of souls, tiny shards crusting in her eyes. She doesn’t cry.

They reach Garnet, stopped several metres ahead. She doesn’t point, but they all know where they stand. The cool blue dais that once occupied a critical strategic role in their battle is gone. Disappeared, like a twisted illusion. They will have to find another way back to the temple.

Rose sighs and immediately winces with regret. There air is still but she can’t clear the taste of salt and rock from her throat. Bile (or something similar) rises and she chokes it down, sick with it. There is a trembling in her legs hidden beneath the wide girth of her skirts but her hands are cool and still.

She turns and they follow her curls, still clutching her hands from behind. It is a slow and arduous procession, and she thinks their feet would bleed if they were able. She almost wishes they could, that she could feel blood rushing and pumping and leaking out and she could prove to herself that they are all alive.

They all know where they’re headed, but they don’t know if it’s the right direction. They’re desperate for a warp pad, and weak with it. Weak with revulsion and the desire to be far, far away from here. There is so much debris and so much to clean and they don’t want to be the ones to do it. But there’s no one else, anymore.

The light dims and for a moment Rose thinks she is falling into a sleep she doesn’t need, pushed by depression and despair. She looks up and the sky grows dark with a preternatural night. She can’t remember a time there wasn’t sun on these fields, glinting cruelly against sharp edges and throwing every glimpse of carnage into terrible, sharp relief. It is the first time in years that she can feel the cool kiss of dusk on her skin, the ghost of a memory blowing itself into reality. Her skin prickles with it.

Amethyst and Pearl squeeze her hands from behind and she can feel the question burning in their tightly sealed throats. She has no answers to give them. It is the first true night any of them have ever witnessed on these fields. She can’t offer explanations, but they are moving and looking and awake and alive. So she turns to them, smiles. And it is small but real.

They move in silence together, wary as prey. They are haunted by the ghosts they walk among, and hunted by invisible threats in the stars, far gone in presence but not in mind. The enemy is defeated, crippled and weak and unable to return. But nothing feels like victory.

They walk and walk until clay is smeared beneath their shoes, impossibly caked. They walk on uneven steps, ungraceful, leaving red footprints behind them. And Rose knows they are finally bleeding.

* * *

 

The temple is cold with disuse once they arrive, dragging bodies aching beyond reason. Rose knows she should check to see that they are alright, but they clamber to the door and enter their chambers, individually, in line. There is no more energy left for shoving, for fighting each other. She knows she should follow after but she is nauseous with relief. She has no more tears left.

She enters her room and lets the clouds catch her in their embrace. All her wanting has been leached from her bones. She closes her eyes and falls into the void of an endless, dreamless sleep. Now at the end of the world, there is no more comfort than oblivion.

* * *

 

Pearl is the first to emerge from her room. She glows with worry, pacing fretfully in front of the door. She had lain in a pool of water for two seasons, floating listlessly and staring at nothing. Then, she had simply given up her physical form, borne along the falls, tossed weightlessly in the air. She couldn’t stand the silence for much longer.

She waits in the temple, retreating inches from the door each day as the other Gems continue not to emerge. She goes back in only once. The water offers windows into other rooms, and she chances small looks into their states of mind. Amethyst has given up her form, her gem nestled in a small trash mound of indiscernible garbage. Garnet sits, legs crossed, arms wrapped tightly around her own chest as though she can not bear to be alone. As though she wants to retreat farther into herself. As though she wants to forget she was ever anyone else.

She doesn’t risk a glance at Rose.

She waits, moons and suns passing. Eventually she gets to the beach, sits on the sand and watches the stars circle endlessly overhead. Waves crash mercilessly against a rocky shoreline and she can feel the world buoying her up, almost close enough to touch the sky. She is lonelier than she can ever remember being, before Rose.

Amethyst joins her, stretching, yawning, feline. She watches the sky too, and takes on the shapes of grotesque, half-remembered creatures native to the planet. There is noise, now. Sounds of life. They remember that they are alive, together.

Amethyst nips at her heels and Pearl lets her. They chase each other in the sand, grooves deep until the water washes their steps away. The dullness in their chests hollows out and they fill it with noise and laughter and motion. Garnet arrives and finds them panting on the beach, out of breath.

She smiles big, bright, and sings to them. _We are not alone_. Or maybe, more accurately, they are alone together. They dance, frantic with energy, ready to stomp their places back into the world. It is not the first time they come together, swirling and bright in flashes of colour. But it is the first time they wake with such harmony, feeling such power come alive in their veins and not immediately needing to defend themselves; attack.

They exist only to exist.

They take large strides down the beach and pick up boulders larger than the entrance to the temple. They shout to the sky and celebrate their freedom. After days, weeks, months, they are ready to be. Here. Stars circle overhead and the sea washes the ground beneath their feet and they can finally gasp in large lungfuls of clean, untainted air.

Alexandrite doesn’t know where Rose is, what she’s doing. She hasn’t emerged from her room and they don’t know whether she’s sleeping in her gem or on the clouds. They stomp and twirl and laugh and wait for her to wake up.

* * *

 

She can see the border of it from where she stands. Soft red earth peeks out from beneath heavy dunes of blackened soot and shining, glittering shards. The hilts of giant weapons litter the site like grave markers, jutting broken and defiant into the sky. They are mountains; too heavy to move.

Rose moves hesitantly forwards, daunted by the size of the task before her. There are so many - too many. All these pieces left of other Gems that had fought and died. Their allegiance dead with them.

She thinks of her fountain, full to bursting with healing tears and impossibly full. So many injured. Dead. Is it even possible to help them anymore? She is moving, ever forward, just skirting the edge of the battlefield. The full fabric of her skirts brush against the dirt and she pretends she doesn’t see the shards clinging to the edges.

Pieces that are too small - the dust; those are impossible. She could never hope to separate them. They number infinite, littering the ground uncountable, like droplets of water in the ocean. If she walked through them, sifted into them, she would drown, dragged down by the weight of conscience and responsibility.

She stands at the edge and stares out at the sea of gems, waiting without a lifeline.


	2. Fertilizer for a garden

“What are we doing?” Amethyst kicks at a rock, sending it careening into a dune. A cloud of dust explodes upwards, shining in the light, shards skittering down. She stops, stock still, frozen against the watching eyes of spirits.

“We’re going to collect them.”

“But, why?” Pearl’s confusion and distaste are transparent on her face, settled into the corners of her mouth, the set of her eyes. “What are we going to do with them?”

Rose smiles, all soft curves and gentle lines. “The best we can.”

Garnet stands, nearer the border that marks the drifts than anyone else. She puts hands out, and reaches into the dune. A cracked gem, mostly whole, emerges, glowing deep blue. “I found one.”

“She came out mostly whole,” Rose has wonder in her words, eyes bright. “Just let me bubble it.” She reaches out, arms extended, fingers wide. Then a dazzling striation of lights burst out and the gem has disappeared. “Have any others survived?” She steps forwards, suddenly eager, skirts swirling in the debris.

Pearl stands behind her as Amethyst begins to walk through the drifts. She takes large, awkward steps, gaining and losing footing both at once, arms pinwheeling for balance and catching handfuls of dust. She shakes shards out of her hair as she moves, split ends catching them like tangled nets. Hands root blindly on the ground. “I found . . . half? I think.” She squints with her one visible eye, turning the chunk over in short fingers. She scours the floor with her other hand, making wild, sweeping motions. “There’s another piece.”

“Is that all of it?”

A shrug. “I dunno.” She makes some effort to fit the pieces together, and they do make up most of a fractured whole. She bubbles it as is.

Pearl stands, still at the edge, so unwilling to venture in. Her shoulders are stiff and high, unwavering as her penchant for order. “What if they’re Homeworld Gems? What are we going to do with them?”

“We can’t just leave them like this.” Rose feels warm, getting warmer. She can help them, she should be able to, and the possibility of it is enough to make her glow with hope. “Maybe I can fix them.”

“Fix? Rose, you don’t know -”

“You don’t either, Pearl.” The words are softer than air as they drift towards her, with all the weight of a slap. Pearl swells, standing taller and taller until it looks like she might float off the face of the Earth. She turns abruptly to the nearest pile without stepping into it, and shifts through its contents with the end of her spear. She doesn’t reach out once, eyes downcast.

“Please. Just bubble whatever you find.”

Rose bends, separating shards from blasted bits of earth. She gathers as many sizable pieces as she can, sends them off to the temple. They’re spirited away to safety, to familiarity. Away from a place so marred with destruction and terror. Pieces of her army stiffen up her skirts, and she wades farther in.

They make some progress, but not much. Large chunks of broken earth and rock emerge from beneath the shifting silt, rising like sleeping beasts as they work. They’ve found so many, with so many yet to go. The sheer magnitude of what they’re doing comes rushing up to greet her, a near insurmountable wall taller than the world. She closes her eyes, and keeps going.

After several hours the monotony takes its toll on Amethyst. She flops dramatically backwards, hair fanned out behind her, dark with ash. She stares at the sky, unblinking, and her eyes grow round, wide, watery. The ground is wet beneath her, loose particles clinging to her skin like film. Garnet walks over, Pearl in reluctant tow, heels scraping against the ground. They drag Amethyst back to the warp pad as she begins to make trembling angels in the dust.

“We’ll be right back Rose,” Garnet calls, voice impossibly calm. Pearl says nothing, staring at the floor, at Amethyst’s shaking limbs, the dampness of her skin. Covered in the grounds of an army.

“It’s alright.” Rose yells, loud and sad and worried. “I’ll come right after you. Please, get her to rest, a shower. I’ll be there in a moment.”

The warp swallows them like a perfect flame of light before she’s even finished her thought. She looks down, fingers clenched so hard together they burn. Coming back here, digging through the dead. Is this selfishness? She already knows she won’t ask them back again.

She looks up against the glare.The field stretches out in front of her, wild, immeasurable. Rose is so tired of slipping, unsure, through the heavy mounds. As she moves to stand on a chunk of broken earth, marbled with layers of clay and sediment, it shifts beneath her feet. She is buffeted by a cool breeze as it rises unsteadily, coming to hang straight in the air.

There’s a rumbling beneath her, the Earth shaking itself apart. The other hunks of rock and root come floating up to join her, suspended in an uneven, disjointed bridge across the sky. The dust slides off as it moves, ashes floating, aimless. The breeze picks up again, whisking them off to some other corner.

Rose peers over the edge of her floating island and sees a sea of glass below, dangerous and beautiful. She sits and puts her head in her hands. And laughs.

* * *

 

The fountain is stained colourful. There are shades of reds and greens and blues, jewel toned hues that decorate it senselessly. There’s a certain beauty to the chaos that doesn’t escape her, gruesome though it is. She wipes at the lip, but the colours remain.

She turns to the bubble she’d brought with her. Small, a teardrop running a deep, pure blue. A gem that’s nearly whole. She takes a breath, hopeful if not entirely confident, and drops it in the pool. There’s a glowing, a bright sense of warmth, and then . . . Nothing. She places her hands on the rim, and pushes herself over until she’s directly above it.

The crack is still there.

She sighs, arms suddenly heavy, and lets herself slump against the edge. Fingertips dangle in the water, pleasantly cool. She closes her eyes for a moment, almost able to imagine the bright glow of her magic against the inside of her eyelids.

Rose finally fishes out the gem, dancing lazily across the pure white marble bottom of the fountain. It’s so close to being whole again. She brings it up to her face, eyes squinting as she scrutinizes it. A bright pink bubble pops up around it, and she sends it back to the temple in disjointed shafts of light.

She reaches for another, fingertips glancing against light waves, reaching through space for another chance. The bubble she pulls out has two, three pieces in it. They’re big, or big enough. She lets the bubble pop over the pool, with a sound like breath escaping, and watches the pieces swim. They don’t gravitate towards one another, not naturally, so she pushes them together with gentle hands, cupping them together.

They’re silent between her fingers.

Liquid drips off her hands, running together, drops desperate to find each other before falling back into the fountain. She picks up two of the pieces, the third left to dry in the sun. A discerning eye does little to help her find the edges where they might fit together, like a well-cut puzzle might do. She finally picks an orientation that looks right, and dips them in the water. Nothing is no longer a surprise.

She picks them up again, rearranges them, fingers grasping. A puzzle that might not have an answer. There’s a pattern here, a logic that she isn’t finding as she tries different orientations, always changing. It is hard not to be impatient, even if she has nothing but time.

It is hours, it is days, when she finally finds it. The pieces glow in the water, her arms drooping listless over the sides suddenly snapping taut as it lights her face, her eyes. Finally, a success! There’s another piece to add, to rearrange, but she is drunk with this, small victory that it is. Rose watches, stars growing bigger in her eyes as she holds this small, fragile piece, almost afraid to even lift it from the water.

Pulling it into her lap as she sits, she feels a thrumming pulse in her palms, from the gem or her skin she can’t tell. She holds more than this piece in fragile fingers; she holds the heart of friends and followers, of a lifetime of laughter and no longer feeling small. Alone. She laughs and holds the prospect of a second chance tight against her, like a talisman, her head finally lifting from the ground.

She remains, seated on the edge, watching colours bleed through the sky.

* * *

 

Pearl is the first to come looking for her. The silence of her approach is so uncanny, her work so engrossing, that she doesn’t hear her. Not until she’s standing behind her, arm already tentative on her shoulder. The touch is a shock, like a slap of ice after the warmth of sleep.

“Rose? What are you doing?” The question is a courtesy, they can both see the bubbles floating around her head like a halo. Shards are scattered on the floor beside her, arms halfway submerged.

“Pearl, it’s amazing!” Rose’s eyes are frantic in the way of someone who hasn’t slept in days. Wide and searching and too, too bright. “I thought that the damage was too deep, but look!” She lifts cupped hands out of the fountain, water running through her fingers like a sieve. Nestled in her soft pink palms is half of a tourmaline gem, edges sharp enough to cut. “This used to be in three, four pieces. And now . . .” She rubs a thumb, soft, against the jagged break along the side. “Its shape is coming back.”

Pearl takes it carefully from her hands and Rose watches, unnerving. She studies it with a scientist’s eye. The smoothness of its surface - there are no cracks, no telltale lines. “I can’t believe it,” she says, her voice thick with the taste of dust. “It broke so cleanly.”

Rose laughs. “No, no of course not. They never do. Can you imagine? After the sky grew so bright?” She reaches back, fingers insistent, and takes the half-formed gem from Pearl’s glowing white palm. “It’s like putting together a puzzle without knowing the whole picture. And some of the pieces are so worn, they don’t quite fit together anymore.”

She turns the piece over in her hands, studying it almost absently. “It’s a little bit of logical thinking, and more guesswork. Can you guess how long it took for me to put this piece back together?”

Pearl frowns, the kind that spreads creases deep in the skin. “How long?”

“Nearly three days of non-stop trying.” Her smile is somewhat unsteady, but she turns to her, excitement lighting a new fever in her eyes. “But Pearl! Oh, this is exactly the kind of thing you’re so good at. Puzzles, and logic. You’ve got such a sharp, critical eye.”

“But Rose . . . this is a daunting task. You saw that field, it was littered with gem shards. How will we even know we’re putting the right pieces together?”

“Pearl, we can’t force different gems together. You know my healing doesn’t work that way.” A soft glare hides in narrowed eyes.

“But, but how will we even know when to give up? There’s a near infinite number of possible ways for these shards to fit together!”

“That’s why I need you Pearl.” She drops the gem back in the fountain, reaches out to hold slender hands. “You’re so perfect for this. Smart, analytical. You can help me catalog all the gem shards, help me decide how much two pieces can be tried before they’re deemed incompatible. You’re just the partner I need for this project.”

Pearl flushes nearly the colour of the hands that hold hers. “Oh.” She looks away quickly, carefully, eyes frantically scanning the space. “Yes, well. I suppose it only looks hopeless now because you don’t have a system in place. Goodness Rose, that bubble is holding more than one colour. Really, it is kind of a mess.” She softens, slows. “Really. What would you do without me?”

Rose smiles, big and wide and steady. “I’m sure I couldn’t survive.”


	3. Imperfect harmony

They’ve been gone, occupied, for nearly three weeks. Disappeared off the face of the earth. Amethyst breaks into bouts of loud laughter, of screaming, of running and breaking and doing. It is even lonelier than silence, her noise the only sound to break through the thick curtain of quiet. Garnet sits with her, sometimes, without speaking. She does not need company to find conversation.

“They’re coming back though, aren’t they?” It is the first time that she sounds as young as she is.Too young to have seen so much carnage, too young to have been forced to choose sides. Too young for a war.

It takes a minute for Garnet to realize she hasn’t vocalized a response. “Of course.” The silence stretches, thinner and thinner, and Amethyst turns away, ready to resume cathartic destruction. “They won’t be gone forever.”

“Do you know that?”

“ . . . Of course.”

Amethyst accepts this with a willful solemnity. Too trusting, or too willing to believe.

They have nothing but time, now. And it is terrifyingly empty.

It is coincidence that they run into one another, after stretches taken down the beach, letting the salt water crust against their skin, briny and sharp. They return briefly, before the sun has set, to gather whaling stones and other frivolous communications devices, ready to throw them into the depths of the ocean. She is standing there, still and glowing like a marble statue, watching the warp pad. Her hands are folded neatly against her waist, held tight.

“Pearl?”

She turns too fast, a messy pirouette. “Garnet! Amethyst!”

“Where have you been Pearl?” Amethyst runs up to her, eyes wide and voice wider. “ Where’s Rose?”

Slender fingers fidget, steeple. “She’s at the fountain. Her fountain.”

Garnet steps closer, arms folded. “. . . She’s really trying it.”

“Yes.”

Amethyst turns to each of them, searching. “Trying what? What’s she doing? Why haven’t we seen her in months?” Her voice breaks and they all pretend it doesn’t.

“She’s trying to fix them.”

“Fix them? What do you mean?” Shock registers, uncomprehending. “Wait, do you mean . . . ? All those shards, all that crystal dust? She’s trying to put them back together?”

“Yes.”

“But, but that’s impossible! There are so many pieces! She’ll never be able to figure out where everything goes!”

Garnet stops her, a hand on her shoulder. “We don’t know it’s impossible.” Her reassurance has weight, carries a comforting warmth that drapes around Pearl like a shawl. Until she turns to her and asks, “But do you know it can be done?”

Pearl turns away, arms folded, eyes tired. “We’ve made amazing progress. Pieces are coming back together. We even managed a whole gem.”

Garnet waits, and Pearl obligingly feeds into the silence. Amethyst perks up, bright and hopeful. “Does that mean there are more Gems? On our side?”

The other two stare at the vastness of the temple, at it’s emptiness. Pearl lets the space suffocate her words. Then she turns. “None of them have woken up yet. We don’t know i- when they will.”

Amethyst is nearly dancing, tripping around Garnet with restless energy. She grabs a whaling stone from the pile stacked against one wall and heaves it overhead. “But there’ll be more! Eventually. More Gems!” She throws the stone against the ground, a reckless spike, and the sound it makes resonates in the vast space, fading quickly. The whaling stone remains pristine.

She comes up to the temple door, tracing the outline of gem paths in the pattern on the door. “Their rooms will be full again! Full of Gems!” She almost laughs, remembering the sound and thrum of community, so large and efficient. Burning with urgency and energy.

Garnet watches, turning to Pearl. Silent. Pearl can’t meet her eyes. “I should go. I promised Rose I would bring her lathe.” Her long legs carry her, quickly, softly, away. “. . . She’ll be waiting.”

Amethyst is already running over, smile big and damning. “Do you guys need help? How can I help?” And Pearl moves faster.

“Come on, Amethyst.” Garnet is stoic as she beckons her over. “We need to do our part here. Rose needs us to start breaking any contact with the Homeworld.”

Pearl is already on the warp pad, shifting away.

“Now, how many of these whaling stones do you think you can chuck in the sea?”

* * *

 

Pearl returns, and all the brightness in her eyes as she looks into her face eclipses any of the lingering guilt. Rose can’t see anything but dedication, devotion. Belief in this work that they’ve both undertaken. Partners. They work night and day without any sense of time, and soon their collection of half-completed Gems grows. Pearl imagines the temple ceiling hung heavy with pink orbs, bright and colourful and shining. It helps her keep going, keep working. She barely ever stops.

Rose works with the same fervor. Understated, quiet, calm. She rushes without rushing, works hard and pushes harder. Forces her healing powers to work beyond their limits without really noticing any of the side effects. She collapses, chest heaving, eyes heavy, after a month of non-stop work. She doesn’t look harried but the sheen on her skin has faded a shade and she can’t stop staring at the sky.

Pearl instigates mandatory rest periods after that.

It is during one of these brief respites that it happens. Rose sits against the steps leading into the courtyard, hands fiddling with two halves of a Gem, trying different orientations together. The stone is cool on her back, her hair bright against the gray. She can feel more than hear Pearl in the distance, cataloging, organizing. There is a uniformity to her work that is reassuring, familiar. A bright spot against the sea of gray in her mind.

The gem halves clack lightly together as she rotates them, not looking. The shapes of the clouds, their brightness, their density, are all distracting in the way of one who can never stop being fascinated by new organic marvels. She could close her eyes if she wasn’t so intent on not missing a single thing. She still almost doesn’t notice the dim glow, the sudden immovability of the pieces in her hands. There’s a flash of searing heat, and she drops the gem to the ground.

It’s whole. She picks it up and turns it over, and it is perfect, unbroken. She feels like she’s learned something, but she can’t decide what, so she calls Pearl over. She comes bearing a checklist, ticking boxes off as she walks, never really looking up. She sees the gem in Rose’s hands and nearly trips.

“Rose! You were supposed to be taking a break!” Concern burns low in her eyes. “Remember, when you collapsed it took nearly a week for you to get back to normal!”

Rose just turns the gem over wonderingly, her fingers searching blindly along the surface. “I didn’t do anything. It just happened on it’s own.

They are, neither of them, sure of what to do next.

“So. What now?” Pearl looks at it, held tight in Rose’s beautiful fingers, so stable a cage. She makes no move to touch it.  
  
“I guess,” Rose starts, surprise breaking in her words, “I guess we have to wait and see.”

Pearl moves closer, head hovering just next to soft, fragrant curls, looking down on the bright green ball. “Do we know who it is?”

Rose smiles, and Pearl does too. But she is not reassured.

* * *

 

 She carries it around in a little pouch on her hip. Pearl doesn’t ask her where it came from, but she doesn’t need to. There are still small stems poking through the woven fabric, too strong to be plucked.

They come to the temple more often. They have an infinite age to put those gems back together again; the fever has left Rose’s thoughts and she sits and laughs. Relaxes with the friends who are now family - an alien term no longer so alien. They make jokes together and watch Amethyst discover a home without conflict and terror. They sit and watch the sky and they begin to feel happy.

And still, they return to her fountain, visits no longer spaced so close together, no longer running for weeks on end. They extend an invitation to Garnet and Amethyst, to help them with the work only once. It is denied kindly and immediately and they never speak about it again.

Pearl and Rose stand, stretch, and return to her makeshift hospital. They work together in varying degrees of silence and noise. Sometimes intentionally, often to one another. They laugh and there is joy and a genuine calmness, the growing feelings of peace.

They are happy for so long.

It is months, days, years later when Pearl finally passes by, and stumbles over a downward glance. Her breath immediately grows, nonsensically, erratic. Her scalp gets hot, her face hotter, and she can feel the beginning of perspiration start to bead on her forehead when she asks, “Where is the Gem?”

Rose stops, pleasantly surprise, and glances down at her pouch. Empty. Working hands still to stone and her voice drops, quiet. Quieter. “Oh.”

“Oh? What do you mean ‘Oh’?” The distinct slap of her footsteps echo, the meter picking up as she moves frantically, faster. “When did it disappear? Did you see what happened to it?”

“Pearl, please calm down.” Her voice is soothing, an intentional caress. “It probably just rolled out of the pouch while I was climbing the statue.”

“But then wouldn’t it be here, somewhere?”

“It was a sphere. It could have rolled pretty far.”

Pearl stops, arms akimbo, panic fading. “Right, yes. Of course.” She lets out a laugh that’s more a bark, relief evident. “It’s been months already. It’s probably just fallen out.”

“Here, we can keep an eye out for it while we work.”

“But shouldn’t we look for it? What if something happens . . .”

A soft hand rests on her shoulder, warm and comforting. “Nothing’s going to happen. It’ll be fine, Pearl.”

“We’ll find it eventually.”

Rose turns back to her work and Pearl follows, the beat of panicked footsteps softly fading. She searches under things and around them, and soon the mechanical methodology of her work soothes her. Rose watches for a moment, then turns to the fountain, to the shards of fallen still waiting for their chance. She doesn’t bother looking.


	4. Cracks in the China

The tranquility is so seldom broken. They have fallen into routine: sorting, moving, fitting together. All underscored by the constant scratch of fingers against digital projection, recording new data, cataloging old pieces. There is an understanding in their silence. A peace.

So when they come barreling in, stride wide and fast, pounding against stone, they start. They turn, weapons drawn, at the ready. Even so many days without conflict can’t erase the sticky residue it leaves, absorbed into their skin, suddenly present at even the merest thought of danger. The sky is darker without changing, and the air is thick with battle and pain and they are panicked at the sight of their friends running towards them. So fast, when they shouldn’t need to be.

They forget where and when they are and Rose’s shield already lies heavy on her arm, battle strategy ready to fly on the tip of her tongue.

“Come quickly.”

After that entrance they can hardly move any other way.

They emerge in a desert temple; a sanctuary built by some of the first gems to emerge. A waiting place. An in-between, while they waited to be collected back to homeworld. No fights ever took place on these hallowed grounds, but the walls slope with shades of ruin after so long untended. Sand blows into their face and their hair and they feel the discord of it’s grandeur and it’s emptiness.

Rose’s shield still hangs at her side, but her stance is no longer so combative.

“Why are we here?” Pearl looks around, first to break the silence. The spear in her hand is relaxed beyond caution.

Amethyst and Garnet stare straight ahead, and Rose follows their example. Looking for movement, searching for discrepancies in an abandoned atmosphere.

“Garnet? Please just tell me . . .”

“Shhh!” She hisses, loud. Her hands never move from their fists, held defensive before her. Pearl starts, alarmed, surprised. She almost lets out a sigh, almost turns in frustration, before she can see the sand shifting on her slippers.

The spear is slipped back in front of her, with a seamless, practiced motion. “What’s in there?”

“We don’t know.” Amethyst’s voice is too high, her face lifted higher. The thrumming sound of motion runs just under her words, threading through them like a manic meter. “We were just looking for something to do and when we came it was already here!”

Garnet’s teeth are clenched. “I’ve never seen it before. It wasn’t here before.”

Rose is already striding forwards, tall, drifts of dust swirling into waves in her wake. The others don’t hesitate before they follow.

“Rose, you haven’t seen it yet! You don’t know what it is!” Amethyst runs, pumping hard to keep up with their longer strides.

“No,” she agrees.

Garnet’s voice is measured. “Rose. What are we going to do?”

The closer they get, the more they can hear. There’s a skittering, shuffling sound, and a large mound of sand comes rushing down to greet them. They grit is nearly blinding, and they shield their faces, even as they dart to the left.

“Does anyone see it?” Pearl calls, echoes muffled against the grains.

“Nothing!” Garnet answers, and she can hear the sound of sand being ground between her teeth.

“I’ve got eyes!” Amethyst calls, and they turn, ready to run over, when the large silhouette of a many-limbed, skittering insect comes crawling out of the sand towards them. There’s a glimpse of wild lavender hair stuck wildly on its head, obscuring its vision.

“Keep hold, Amethyst! For as long as you can!” Rose’s voice is commanding, bellowing, and the sound of it sends them into action the way nothing else can. Adrenaline races through every appendage, instantaneous. Their stances are more sure, their weapons so steady. “Circle it from behind Garnet! Cut off it’s escape!”

Rose is already leaping, off the highest perch, ready to tackle it. Her sword hangs heavy, point downwards. There is no turning back.

The explosion of air and dust blinds them for a moment, nearly sweeping Amethyst into a nearby wall.

“Well.” Pearl starts, delicately dusting particles off her shirt. “That was easier than expected.”

“Yeah,” Amethyst laughs. “It was fun!”

“It’s not fun, Amethyst! Anyway, Rose and I have to get back. We left everything in such a state . . .”

She stops when she sees Rose, a silhouette in the dust. She’s standing still, so still, staring down. At the small, round green orb that lies at her feet.

“Rose?” Pearl is stricken, suddenly. Hand to her mouth, eyes wide, searching. “Rose, is that . . .?”

“What?” Amethyst peers around tufts of hair, lying upside down on the floor. “What are we looking at?”

“Yes,” she answers, in a whisper so quiet it should be impossible to hear.

“Rose, how did this happen?” Garnet stalks over, pragmatic, shades unreadable.

She’s silent for a while, her pink curls a veil against them. “They’re too unstable.” She sighs, head lifted, resigned. Her smile is wistful. “I thought I could fix it. I thought I could help them.”

“Rose! We have to go back, we have to go back right now! All those gems, all those pieces! We just left them scattered on the ground!” There is a panic in her voice that shakes it’s way into her skin, her bones. She’s already moving, feet barely skimming the ground, dancing on air, fast, fast, faster.

She makes it to the warp mere steps before Rose, but there’s no way to catch up.

When the light leaves, they stand in the empty pit around her fountain. Pearl is sitting, legs crossed, on the ground. Staring at nothing.

Rose wanders in, amazed. “Were they all gone? All of them?”

Pearl shakes her head. “There were a handful left. Enough for three bubbles, maybe.”

“So they’re all gone . . .”

She gazes around, lapsing into thoughtful silence. So many gems, just . . . disappeared.

“Rose,” she starts, soft, hesitant. Afraid. “What does this mean?”

She stood at their forefront once, leader, strategist, friend. She worked so long, so hard, learning, studying, analyzing. She thought she knew almost everything, when she was younger and more naive. Rose has no more answers now.

* * *

  

They stand in the temple together, battered, exhausted. Two more gems have been bubbled and secured and they are tired of running in circles. Amethyst’s gem lies, silent, on the temple floor between them.

“There are so many of them!” Pearl sits, back against the rough stone of the wall. It’s touch is cool; a kiss against her skin.

Rose’s words are soft. “There were so many of us.”

There is too much silence in the temple without Amethyst. Rose throws herself backwards, dramatic, buoyed by her pillowy hair. Her eyes slide close but she doesn’t sleep because she doesn’t know how.

“What are we going to do?” Pearl is talking just to talk, words thrown carelessly into the air. “There are so many of them. How will we find them all?”

Rose doesn’t respond. Her hair rustles as she shifts, soft as silk, cocooning herself in a layer of gauzy, candy pink. Everything she sees is coloured Rose.

“What if we never find some of them?” Pearl worries to herself, the silence filled with her busy thoughts. “What if they hide, or escape, and just start destroying things? What if they find each other and destroy the planet? What if -”

“It’ll be okay Pearl.” Garnet is the one to interrupt her tirade. “We’ll do what we have to.”

Pearl is quiet, but her hands are restless, fingers tangling in the air. She would knot them if she were able. “But what if —” Amethyst pops up, a too bright display, a mess of hair and limbs and asymmetry.

“Shh.” Garnet barely moves. “Not yet, Amethyst.”

“Sorry.” She’s gone as soon as she comes, echo still audible. “I got bored.”

* * *

 

 They find her in her fountain, surrounded by bubbled gems, eyes wide and tired. She holds their most recent acquisition in her hands, submerged in the pool of healing lachrymose. Long scratches spill light around her arms, her figure distorted. The water bubbles violently around her, froth spilling on the stones at her feet.

“Rose, what are you doing?” Pearl rushes first, steps so light, so fast. Hands already pulling, pulling, trying to make her let go. Make her see.

“It’s so small, Pearl.” She looks down at her hands but she doesn’t see what she’s holding. “So frightened. I thought maybe there was still something . . .”

“Rose, you’re trying so hard! And you can keep trying, I believe in you but . . . When is the last time you sat down to recuperate? You’re burning yourself out! Look at you!” She grabs her hands, forces them out of the water, releases them from their death grip. Something slithers in the fountain, just out of sight. “You’re getting too bright.”

And it’s true. Rose is glowing, so bright, brighter. Her skin pulses with an erratic rhythm, the light pushing and pulling out like waves on the shore. She’s so out of focus it takes her a moment to register what she’s seeing.

“Oh.”

There’s a splashing sound as Garnet reaches into the fountain, hand quick as an arrow. A large, wriggling centipedal screeches and spits, acid dissolving a round hold in the stone of the ground. It dangles, undignified, from the tufts of its mane.

“I’m sorry, Rose. But this is getting dangerous.”

She laughs, almost, a tired, sad sound. “Don’t be silly Garnet. No one’s getting hurt.”

“Rose,” Pearl says, and she feels like shaking her, like shaking the ghosts and bones and battles out of her world-weary eyes. “Rose it’s tearing you up. You have to go back to the temple.”

Rose shakes her head, so sure without any basis, wild curls flying. “Pearl, not yet. There is still so much to do! And I’ve saved some for you. To help me study.”

“Saved . . . some?” Her brow furrows. “Saved some what?”

Rose turns, and Pearl sees them. Bubbled gem creatures, writhing in the shadow of Rose’s fountain, pressed up in large mounds against the wall. Mouths open in silent screeches. There’s a ticking, a soft shuffling in between them, the bubbles moving and shifting like beads in a bowl. The harsh shine of a claw flashes, no barrier between it and the world.

Garnet moves the fastest, immediately knee deep in bubbles, rooting in the dark for legs and tails. “Amethyst, Pearl! They’re escaping!”

But Pearl is already tracking the movements, the soft ticking against stone, the shine in the mess. She strikes hard and fast so she doesn’t have to think. Not about these creatures, or all the gems Rose gathered, or all the Gem temples that have been destroyed. Not about the war.

“I’ve got ‘em!” Amethyst stands upright, triumphant. A mess of small, tangled limbs dangle from a tight fist, scratching and biting and angry.

They’re all smashed against stone, squished to pulp; work that is dirty and angry and terrifying. They pretend not to remember who they hold in their hands, and it works. Well enough.

“Did we get them all?” Amethyst dives through, kicking bubbles out of the way and pretending they’re marbles or balls. She won’t look anything in the face.

“Rose,” Garnet calls, voice steady. “How many bubbles should there be?”

Rose smiles, vacant. “I don’t know. I was hoping Pearl would help me catalog them once she arrived.”

The sharpened end of a spear stabs through a bubble, impaling a writhing creature in its cage. She pauses halfway down, hands ready to trap it. “You don’t know how many there are?” Her hands shake so hard she nearly smacks the gem away.

“Rose, do you think we got them all?” Amethyst is not the pragmatist, but she can see the slope of shoulders, the shake of fists. Garnet and Pearl are on the cusp of a realization they aren’t ready for. She knows that expression; the devastation and uncertainty. The same expression she wore when she emerged into the world; a different situation but a universal feeling.

Rose has sleepy eyes and a sleepy gait, and she glides over in a cloud of torpid energy. “Yes,” she says, solemn. “That looks about right. That’s all of them.”

Pearl is fighting breaths that she doesn’t need, hands clenching tight, so tight. “I’m sure it’s fine. I’m sure Rose has a good idea of how many there are. It’s fine. It’ll be fine.”

“Come on, Rose.” Garnet walks over, still and tall and in control. “I think you need to go back to the temple now.”

“Of course. Just let me get all these Gems back . . .”

“It’s okay Rose, Pearl and I will get them!” Amethyst elbows Pearl mid-thigh, too hard. Neither one of them notice.

“Thank you so much.” Rose is faraway without moving, eyes kind and smile slow. “My Crystal Gems.”

They turn to one another, apprehensive, as she steps on the warp pad. She never once looks back. 


	5. When the stars came crashing down

The night is velvet. Tranquil and beautiful. Rose stares up at stars she can no longer reach and marvels at serendipity and circumstance.

There were so many of them. At the start. More than she thought she would ever be able to count, ready to lay down their arms and their lives at her feet. And even more against them, in a tide rising higher and higher, solidifying into a mirror of destruction and futility.

She doesn’t turn her gaze when she feels the sand shift beside her, the sound of waves lapping the shore almost indistinguishable from another body settling into the beach. The stars are so bright, tonight.

Rose wonders sometimes, what she would do if she had the chance. If they had the materials, the technology. Would she choose to leave this planet? Gather all the gems and disappear, far out into the ether? Would they leave behind the memories, the battles and the nightmares and the death? The history on this planet, and their place in it; so muddied and dark. When she thinks about this place, would she be content to let all the anger and frustration and disappointment colour her perception?

Of course not. There’s so much pain here. Maybe too much. She lets out a sigh, rising full from within her, rumbling in her throat. She wants new memories.

“Rose.” The figure beside her speaks, for the first time. A white, slender hand catches one of hers, turning it palm up. Something smooth and round is pressed into it.

“The Gem.” She doesn’t have to see it to know what it is. The first one to ever become whole again. Her thumb rubs small circles over the surface, soft and soothing. To who, she doesn’t know. “Why did you take it out of the temple?”

The waves fill in the silence, counting beats in their slightly uneven rhythm. Pearl sighs, and looks skyward, arms spread behind her, propping her up. “You’re a very good leader, Rose.”

She waits, hands and Gem in her lap. The ocean spreads out vast before them, an infinite blackness in the night.

“You’re kind and generous. And you have so much love to give. And we made the choice ourselves.” Her arms slip, sand scratching at the skin, until she’s lying down. “You didn’t force us to fight.”

“But I let you.” The words are heavy, sinking immediately into the sand between them.

Pearl laughs, a short, breathy thing. “There’s nothing you could have done to stop us.” A pause. “I know you feel responsible for everything that happened. But you don’t have to. And you shouldn’t. You made a decision you thought was best, and it was. Because we all saw it too; we saw what you were willing to fight for, willing to believe in. And you made us believers.

What I mean is — we’re all responsible for ourselves. And you did so much Rose. You’ve already done so much.”

“I can always do more.”

“That’s the point.” Pearl shakes her head, sand flying from short strands. “You don’t have to save all of us.”

“Pearl, this war. Everything that happened —”

“And you **can’t**. Rose. You’ve made them whole again and that’s already a miracle. All that crystal dust, in so many pieces. I would have thought it was impossible. But it wasn’t. Not for you.” She takes a slow breath, building up the air for the solemnity of what she needs to say. “But I don’t think you can fix the part of them that’s broken.”

She sighs, and Pearl sees it for the first time. The colour of Rose Quartz’s tears. It’s funny, she thinks, distantly. After all the healing sessions she’s had, all the time spent in Rose’s infirmary, she’s had plenty of exposure. But Rose’s healing essence was always so crystal clear. And these tears are a soft, translucent pink.

“I wish I could.”

She’s startled, suddenly. She takes the Gem from her soft, pink fingers, and sends it back. All the words she’s prepared have left her, and she’s grasping for something to say, trying to fish the right phrase out of the air to make everything okay again.

But it’s not okay. So she lays a gentle hand on her arm, and sits with her.

Together they watch the stars.

* * *

 

Every time she closes her eyes she is back there, standing on the battle field, knee-deep in the aftermath. She’s cleaned so much, worked so hard, and still drifts of crystal dust sit there, hopelessly homogenous. This field will never be free of them; the ashes of their fallen.

There were just so many of them.

She’s sometimes surprised, when she opens her eyes and finds herself standing there. Sometimes she isn’t. It was hard to keep track at first; what was real and what she was re-living. It’s getting better. By inches more than miles.

There is a hole in her heart that is as vast as the entire world they stand on. A heart bleeding for every living thing on it, and especially for the ones that are living no longer. She doesn’t know how to leave them. Maybe it’s impossible; she’s never actually tried.

Every once in a while, she takes them out. Just calls the bubbles from the temple, takes them on walks around her fountain as though they’re simply visiting. A twisted form of pretend. She spruces up the place a little bit each time - some bluebells over there when the Aquamarine comes over. A wall of crawling ivy for the Emeralds. Orchids for the Kunzite.

For every shard piece she bubbles, collects, catalogs, she grows another flower. She tries to match them, in colour, in feel, as best as she can to the gem. It’s difficult to be exact. But she tries.

She’s still trying.

* * *

 

The stamp of a single foot rocks the earth, and it’s got at least six. They are long and heavy and impossibly tall. None of them quite measure up.

“Garnet, to the left!” Rose is spinning, pivoting on a point, her shield heavy on her arm. They’ve been chasing this beast through the ruins for hours. Days? Time is running together and running them ragged.

Another massive stomp rocks the ground beneath them, cracks running in the dusty earth. They’ve finally found it - they can see every inch of the beast, from the top of its head to the tip of its tail. It is too big to measure.

“Amethyst, Garnet, I need top and bottom defense!”

It’s cornered now, braced against the largest dead end they’ve ever seen. Perhaps cornered is too generous a description. Rose raises an arm, braces against the floor.

The creature can see them approaching. It arches it’s back, hisses and spits in their direction, which they’re careful to avoid. It’s frightened, she thinks. Or angry. She of all people knows that it’s possible for someone to be both. Amethyst is already underneath it when it begins to lash with its legs, making moves as if it might just scuttle away.

“Incoming!” She calls, and she lifts from beneath the beast, hilariously dwarfed by it in size. Garnet kicks it away from the wall at the same time, and Rose raises her sword high, higher, and jumps as well as she can. The sword goes nearly halfway through.

She lands, exhausted, pink curls sticking wetly to her forehead. Her sword is sheathed too early.

That cut should have been enough to pop it back into its gem. Even now as she turns, watches it, she expects to see it disappear in a puff of air and light. It doesn’t. Instead it writhes, screaming, crying, trying to drag itself forwards like a hinge, constantly folding in around its middle. She counts the seconds and she knows it’s too long but still she doesn’t move forwards. She cannot accept this impossibility.

“Rose, we have to do something!” Pearl is shouting at her, already moving forwards, spear extended. Her form is perfect, graceful, and she arches in a perfect curve, ready to throw. But she’s aiming her spear at the crystal, aiming to crack it, to break it.

She doesn’t realize what she’s doing until she holds the spear in her hands, the tip inches from the faceted surface of the gem.

“Rose?” Amethyst’s eyes are big and wide and confused, but Pearl is mere feet away and looking at her with concern. With worry. Looking at her — for just a moment — like a stranger. It is the first time Rose has ever seen this expression on Pearl’s face. And it is directed at her.

She drops the spear as though it’s burned her, badly, and turns away. They all three stand there, rooted in uncertainty, as Garnet drops high and finishes Rose’s surgery. The force of it’s hibernation is like an implosion, air rushing inwards too loud and too fast. They are scattered and disoriented when the gem finally drops to the ground, shining and pristine.

“Finally!” Amethyst yells, arms thrown in the air. She hangs upside down and makes no move to get up.

Pearl rubs her hair as she emerges from the opposite end of the corridor, hand on her back. “I am exhausted. That took us much longer than I expected.”

“It was bigger than we thought.”

Rose turns. “Garnet’s right. I didn’t realize they got this big.”

“By all accounts, they shouldn’t be able to,” Pearl offers, rubbing dirt from her arm and coming to stand beside her. “Their form should be too unstable to sustain for long.”

Rose looks at the gem, already cradled in a bubble. “And yet.”

“And yet.”

There’s a soft whispering, a shuffling, and Amethyst shoots upwards, fist cracking plaster off the wall.

“Amethyst!” Pearl whips around, fast, en pointe.

There’s a smattering of goo on the wall, but no gem. “It was a bug, I think? Or maybe a baby? Anyway, I got it.” She’s proud, puffed up about such a quick victory after so long being led.

“A baby? Amethyst, they can’t have babies.” Pearl sounds certain, but Rose catches the look she throws her way. “Anyway, it didn’t drop a gem, so it’s probably alright to just leave —”

“There’s another one!” Amethyst jumps up, pointing.

Garnet spins, suddenly, eyes pinned on the wall. “Another one here!”

“One here too.” Rose’s voice is soft as she steps forwards, looking closer. The small creature is scuttling along the wall, tiny and insignificant and yet baring a disturbing likeness to the creature they just dispatched.

“Even more here!” Amethyst offers.

There’s the sound of cracking plaster, of a million moving feet, and suddenly the smooth limestone of the wall is exposed below the plaster and a mosaic of rumbling, running creatures. Some very, terrifyingly new.

She grits her teeth behind a calm facade and tries not to clench her jaw.

“Rose, how is this possible? How can there be so many of them? Where are they coming from?” Pearl’s voice calls out frantic with panic, heavy with strain. “Rose!”

Rose can see it. She can see them all, coming down from crevices, falling from the sky. There are so many of them. Too many to count. Thousands small, too many big. The gems glint in beautiful, sinister kaleidoscopic light, refracted and reflected against the smooth limestone.

They are rumbling and she can hear the anger in the clicks of their mandibles, the sharp stab of appendage into stone. They are threatened with being overrun by sheer numbers. The wall cracks, shudders, the weakness growing larger and larger and louder and louder.

Her shield barely makes it in time, rounding them all up in a single bubble to keep them safe as the rubble rains down. Pieces of rock and body scatter, light exploding as the creatures are forced to give up their forms.

She looses the shield immediately. “Is everyone all right?”

“Fine, fine,” Pearl responds, brushing imaginary dust from her clothes.   
  
“What’s happened to them? Has the threat been neutralized?” Garnet barely moves, but Rose can sense her eyes wandering, twitching, beneath the large, imposing shades.

“I think so,” she sighs, world-weary and suddenly too weighted by responsibility.

“Awesome. Let’s go back.” Amethyst stretches, arms to the sky and deceptively casual. “I need a break.”

The Gems stand on the warp pad and let it take them home - back to the temple on the ocean shore. They are tired and frustrated and part ways almost immediately. Amethyst lounges, looking almost relaxed. Pearl retreats to her room, her posture perfect and natural and only imperceptibly studied. Garnet barely raises a hand in farewell before she wanders outside, never once really looking at her.

They say hello in the morning and return to a routine of laughter and talk together. It is almost as if the entire ordeal in the ruins never happened, as though they were never accosted by enemies too innumerable, too unruly to truly defeat. They walk together and cobble bits and pieces of left-behind technology into games. They race each other on the shores and watch the colours change in the sky. They look happy.

But she doesn’t miss the way their eyes search through shadows, piercing, frightened. They drag dark shapes behind them, heavy on their chains, and move within a circle of small gravity, refusing to venture far from one another. The jump to attention at every noise, even now without weapons drawn, standing ready. There is no more fight left in them, but still there is too much.

Sometimes they stare endlessly at the sky and wait for the crushing blow, other times pretending not to notice the vastness overhead. Rose doesn’t know how to help them, how to make them feel safe. She watches, holds them, and they pretend they to be comforted. She doesn’t know which is worse.

* * *

 

The emptiness of it hangs there, brutal in it’s stillness. She can see the colour of the ground again, a dusty red; every cloud of gem dust blown away. She can’t imagine where it’s all gone — what’s happened to it. Maybe they’ve simply floated off, ready to return to the universe. It’s a nice thought, one she hangs onto, ready to take out again later, to polish and admire.

The other Gems never return here, she knows. They don’t want to face the past so directly; not yet. Maybe they never will. But she breathes the cleanest air, and it is the only sound for miles around, and it is too quiet. Even the wind gives it a wide berth. A dead zone.

It’s a gift she bestows it. The greenness. The writhing, pulsing beat of alive is so conspicuously absent, and she misses it. It’s a small thing, she thinks. To bring a little piece of life back to this place, after it was so long hung with death. Things grow, and thrive. And it’s beautiful.

The field is beautiful again.

She stands there, sometimes, all on her own. Just to think. She returns two weeks later and is greeted by desperate cries of relief, by eyes anxious with uncertainty and faces hollowed by fear of attack. She returns and they clutch at her so hard she doesn’t think she’ll ever be able to find time alone again. She returns and remembers that there are still Gems, here, who need guidance and protection and support. She returns and for a moment, her love eclipses all despair.

She returns to them, and they return her to herself.


End file.
